


Heart, Brain, Heart

by 3seconds, EnglandsGray



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Codes & Ciphers, Emotes, Emoticons, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, Pre-Relationship, Sherlolly - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-29
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-12 09:01:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29007954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3seconds/pseuds/3seconds, https://archiveofourown.org/users/EnglandsGray/pseuds/EnglandsGray
Summary: Sherlock blinks and swallows hard. How is he supposed to respond to that? And why did he ever agree to this stupid game to begin with?Three short scenes in which Sherlock and Molly discover a new way to communicate, and perhaps a new reason to.
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes/Molly Hooper
Comments: 14
Kudos: 41





	1. Baker Street

**Author's Note:**

> Emotes/emojis feature heavily here - they're the reason this whole thing came about! But just in case they don't behave on the device you're reading on, each symbol, or sequence of symbols, is annotated at the end of each chapter.
> 
> A slightly silly but (hopefully) lovely series of scenes which came about thanks to 3seconds teaching EnglandsGray how to use the emotes on the laptop keyboard! This is our first co-creation, but watch this space... :)
> 
> All rights and credit to the creators of Sherlock and the BBC.

“What are you suggesting? That we communicate via a system of ciphers which can be easily read by any moron, but made infuriatingly complicated by our insistence on assigning each its own meaning, specific to our own personal attributes and linked to significant elements of our realtionsh... friendship?”

“Well, after all these years of chemical formulae and – _looking_ – I thought it was a logical progression.” Molly looks up at him at the end of this statement, raises her eyebrows. 

“Hmmm.” Sherlock narrows his, returns his focus to his own phone screen.

“Emojis should be right up your street,” Molly continues, pulling her feet up under her on the settee, settling back against a cushion. “Short, sharp and to the point.”

“Not unlike yourself.”

Molly flicks her eyes up to meet his for a brief moment and the look in them makes his smile falter.

The room is quiet apart from the sound of the bubbling kettle, the air gradually warming thanks to the fire in the grate. The clock ticks languidly while the two of them sit apparently absorbed by the contents of the web. 

The kettle boils with a sharp click. Molly stands, drawing her cardigan around herself and pocketing her phone. She goes to the kitchen, Sherlock’s eyes on her back. 

Molly feels her phone vibrate in her pocket as she reaches for the teabags. She pulls it out, finding a text message on the lock-screen;

☕⚫🍬🍬[1]

She smiles. She is still looking when another message appears.

🙏[2]

[1] [Coffee Cup, Black Circle, Sweet/Candy, Sweet/Candy]

[2] [Please]


	2. Baker Street/St Bartholomew's Hospital

Sherlock stares into the empty salad drawer. His stash of eyeballs is missing.

“They were starting to smell, dear” is the rather inadequate explanation from Mrs. Hudson.

Damn. He was looking forward to experimenting on those.

Thankfully, a well-timed text saves him from an evening of boredom and more than likely a row with his landlady over binning his things while she’s not housekeeping.

🔬🌛 🕵️♂️➡ 🥼🍟❓[1]

Roughly half an hour later, Molly looks up from her work as Sherlock enters the lab. Without a word, he drops a bag of chips onto the workbench beside her computer.

She grins. “I wasn’t sure that was going to work.”

“There’s a first time for everything. Don’t expect it to happen again, unless you come up with something more clever next time than ‘working late, you bring me chips?’”

“Is that a challenge?”

This elicits a half-smile. “Also, they’re not free.”

“How much do I owe you, I’ve got some cash in my handbag.”

She starts towards the locker room, but pauses when her phone pings.

🚫💰, 👁👁👁👁👁[2]

Ohhh… No wonder it worked. She should have known the gesture wasn’t completely altruistic.

“Mrs. Hudson cleaned out your fridge, did she?”

“Molly, there’s really not much point to this if you keep talking” He waves his phone at her.

🦜🦜🥌[3]

Molly rolls her eyes, silently replies in kind.

🙄🙏 🖐👁[4] Then adds 💖💖💖[5]

Sherlock blinks and swallows hard. How is he supposed to respond to that? And why did he ever agree to this stupid game to begin with?

[1] [Microscope, Moon Detective, Right Arrow, Lab Coat, Chips/Fries, Question Mark]

[2] [Negative, Money Bag, Eyeball, Eyeball, Eyeball, Eyeball, Eyeball]

[3] [Bird, Bird, Stone]

[4] [Eyeroll, Thank You, Open Hand, Eyeball] 

[5] [Heart, Heart, Heart]


	3. Waterloo Bridge/St Bartholomew's Hospital

Sherlock strides purposefully over the bridge, aiming for Waterloo Station. His phone buzzes in his pocket. The peculiar feeling somewhere in the space between his gut and his chest is exactly that, but not unfamiliar. He knows what to apportion it to because he’s been here before. In a way. In another, he never has. 

In any case, a physiological reaction to a text alert certainly isn’t a good reason to lose focus on the case. They are closing in, every second is vital. Now is not the time to dwell on:

📺💩 🎭❓ (🕵️♂️ 😱) 🤣[1]

And whether he begrudgingly enjoys their little game or not, whether or not the pixelated retort he has in mind has been bubbling in the pit of his stomach since this message arrived the previous evening, it would have to wait. 

He retrieves the phone, lights the screen, clicks the new message; 

✂️🤚☠️[2]

_Ahhh! Of course._

An hour later, he walks away from the address in Knightsbridge leaving Lestrade to the dull part, wondering why the sense of sated calm he expects at the successful closure of a case, hasn’t come. Then he realises - there is unfinished business - that great stave of peace. He pulls his phone from his pocket, opens the message thread. 

While he processes and plans, scrolling for what he needs, his mind snags on a detail. As is its want. 

Two weeks he and Molly have been exchanging these little blasts of miniature, technicolour-graphic conversation. And no matter whether she poses a simple question (🟠🥜❓[3]), provides him with the missing link as she had earlier, or even fires over a questionably accurate but no doubt heartfelt 🦊🍰 🕵️♂️[4], she has settled to signing off every message with a single, telling, 🫀[5]

It bothers him. If he’s honest with himself, it’s worse. Because it isn’t the symbol that unsettles him, it isn’t the frankly ridiculous turn her morbid humour has taken, it’s how freely she gives what it represents. 

Sherlock pauses on the pavement. Sighs out a breath to the twilight sky. Looks back down at the screen.

🙏💼[6]

🎭🥱 🩰 🚕🏠🕡[7]

…

His thumb hovers over that little cipher. His mind still preoccupied with significance and potential. His chest cavity is full. Seconds tick past. Life ticks away. 

_Willing to give? Yes. Freely...?_

Molly has just finished scrubbing her hands and forearms clean when her mobile buzzes on the counter. She’s knackered and, as much as she’s never likely to be able to stop the little flip in her tummy when her phone goes off, she quietly hopes she’s been clever enough for one day. 

Binning the paper towels, she picks up her phone and opens the message.

The fact he puts up with this daft little distraction they’ve got going is enough of a win for her. She’ll take his 🙄[8] and all the sarcastic 🤔[9] and how the 💀[10] has worked its way to the top of her recently used list. She understands and accepts the signature sign-off he has chosen - 🧠[11] \- and she remains ever happy to just be in touch. Together in this silly, odd little way. 

So, quite frankly, his message floors her. Not the ballet or the fact she has less than an hour to get home and make herself presentable before the taxi – that’s nothing new. It’s the one extraordinary thing he added...

❤️[12]

[1] [Television, Poop Theatre, Question Mark (Detective, Shocked) Rolling on the Floor Laughing]

[2] [Scissors/Cut, Hand, Poison]

[3] [Orange Circle, Nut, Question Mark]

[4] [Fox, Cake, Detective]

[5] [Anatomical Heart]

[6] [Thank you, Case]

[7] [Theatre, Yawn Ballet Shoes Taxi, House, Clock 18:30hrs]

[8] [Eye Roll]

[9] [Thinking]

[10] [Scull]

[11] [Brain]

[12] [Red Heart]

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading <3
> 
> This is an unusual experience for us, not being able to comment on each other's work! 
> 
> So please do that for us, if you fancy - we'd love to hear from you :)


End file.
